SaaS pricing calculator
Find the price that gives a target gross margin, then check what it means for break-even customers, MRR, LTV, LTV to CAC and CAC payback. A handful of inputs, no signup.
Free · Runs in your browser · Updated 26 September 2026
SaaS pricing calculator
1. Price for a target margin
Hosting, support, payment fees: what grows with each customer.
Price that gets you there
$40 / mo
2. Unit economics at that price
Salaries, tools, rent: costs that do not depend on customer count.
Share of customers lost each month.
Sales and marketing spend divided by new customers.
- Gross margin
- 84%$42 left per customer per month.
- Break-even
- 96 customersTo cover the fixed costs.
- MRR / ARR
- $6,000 / $72,000At the customer count above.
- Monthly profit
- $1,040Contribution minus fixed costs.
- Customer lifetime
- 25 months1 divided by monthly churn.
- LTV
- $1,050Margin per month times lifetime.
- LTV : CAC
- 3.5 : 1Return on what you spend to win a customer.
- CAC payback
- 7.1 monthsMonths of margin to earn the CAC back.
LTV here is gross-margin LTV with constant churn and no discounting or upgrades. It is a way to compare choices, not a forecast.
Gross margin 84 percent. Monthly profit $1,040.
The formulas
Every number is a short sum.
| Result | Formula | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Price for a target margin | variable cost ÷ (1 − margin) | 8 at 80% margin: 8 ÷ 0.2 = 40 |
| Contribution per customer | price − variable cost | 50 − 10 = 40 |
| Gross margin | contribution ÷ price | 40 ÷ 50 = 80% |
| Break-even customers | fixed costs ÷ contribution, rounded up | 4,000 ÷ 40 = 100 |
| MRR and ARR | price × customers; MRR × 12 | 50 × 120 = 6,000; 72,000 |
| Customer lifetime | 1 ÷ monthly churn | 1 ÷ 0.05 = 20 months |
| LTV | contribution × lifetime | 40 × 20 = 800 |
| LTV : CAC | LTV ÷ CAC | 800 ÷ 200 = 4 : 1 |
| CAC payback | CAC ÷ contribution | 200 ÷ 40 = 5 months |
What it does not know
A floor for the price, not the price.
The calculator tells you the least you can charge to reach a margin and what your numbers imply. It cannot tell you what customers will pay. Price is set by the value you deliver and what alternatives cost, and margin is only the check that the price leaves enough over.
- Gross margin here counts only variable cost. It ignores fixed costs, which the break-even and monthly profit figures cover.
- LTV assumes churn stays constant and ignores discounting, upgrades and referrals. Real cohorts rarely churn at one steady rate.
- CAC should include everything you spend to win customers (advertising, sales time, tools), divided by the customers won in the same period.
FAQ
Questions people ask first.
- What counts as a variable cost?
- Anything that grows with each additional customer: hosting and bandwidth they use, support time, payment processing fees, licences charged per seat. Salaries, office costs and general tools do not grow with each customer, so they go under fixed costs.
- How do I measure monthly churn?
- Customers lost during a month divided by customers at the start of that month. If you began March with 200 customers and 8 cancelled, monthly churn is 4%.
- Why does LTV use margin and not revenue?
- Revenue is not what you keep. Each month a customer pays you the price but costs you the variable cost, so the value of the customer is the margin they leave over their lifetime. Using revenue overstates it.
- What is a good LTV to CAC ratio?
- A ratio of about 3 to 1 or more is often quoted as healthy, and under 1 to 1 means each customer costs more to win than they return. Treat these as prompts to look closer, not as rules: they depend on your payback time, growth and how sure you are about churn.
- Does this cover annual plans or discounts?
- No. It assumes one price per customer per month and constant churn. For annual plans, use the price per month and be aware that churn happens in larger steps at renewal.
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